BU vs UCI Forum

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UVA2B

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by UVA2B » Sun Apr 23, 2017 10:35 pm

UVA2B wrote:Have you looked into becoming a patent agent or a scientific advisor at a law firm that uses those? Could be a good way to see the inner workings of IP law, while making more than you are now, and should give you some insiders advantage if you decide to pursue a JD in the future? That's just a ton of debt to take on for a non-assured outcome at either.
I actually really hope OP takes this suggestion seriously.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by zot1 » Sun Apr 23, 2017 10:39 pm

ernie wrote:
Deserving Porcupine wrote:
screwtapeletters wrote:Also, I think "collegial environment" is a misnomer. Generally speaking, the higher the employment rate, the more collegial schools will be, 'cause u wont have to be in the top 1/3 to get a job.
This may certainly be the case, for UCI I'd imagine it is a lot of people self-selecting into PI jobs which may make competition for Biglaw and firm jobs a bit more lax.
Irvine's 33.6% PI score is in large part attributable to the school's shockingly high 18.2% school-funded rate. Irvine having a high PI rate is a recent phenomenon, and correlates with a recent increase in school-funded positions.

Irvine's 15.5% biglaw placement is pretty grim. It has a respectable 12.7% clerkship rate, but that's in large part due to Chemerinsky making calls, and the word is out that he's looking to make a move.

Maybe you'll get biglaw, maybe not. You have the IP and PhD thing going for you. But attending either school is still a roll of the dice.
Sigh... here we go again.

UCI is collegial. That's the environment that has been fostered and the kind of students UCI attracts.

Yes, many students are gunning for PI and government over biglaw.

Yes, UCI funds certain positions, but there's more to that than meets the eye. To begin with certain places like OCDA give money to UCI to pay fellows until they get hired permanently. Additionally, most PI places do not hire students right out of graduation. So UCI provides a fellowship that helps the student prove themselves to the organization they're trying to get a job with.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by ernie » Sun Apr 23, 2017 11:19 pm

zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:
Deserving Porcupine wrote:
screwtapeletters wrote:Also, I think "collegial environment" is a misnomer. Generally speaking, the higher the employment rate, the more collegial schools will be, 'cause u wont have to be in the top 1/3 to get a job.
This may certainly be the case, for UCI I'd imagine it is a lot of people self-selecting into PI jobs which may make competition for Biglaw and firm jobs a bit more lax.
Irvine's 33.6% PI score is in large part attributable to the school's shockingly high 18.2% school-funded rate. Irvine having a high PI rate is a recent phenomenon, and correlates with a recent increase in school-funded positions.

Irvine's 15.5% biglaw placement is pretty grim. It has a respectable 12.7% clerkship rate, but that's in large part due to Chemerinsky making calls, and the word is out that he's looking to make a move.

Maybe you'll get biglaw, maybe not. You have the IP and PhD thing going for you. But attending either school is still a roll of the dice.
Sigh... here we go again.

UCI is collegial. That's the environment that has been fostered and the kind of students UCI attracts.

Yes, many students are gunning for PI and government over biglaw.

Yes, UCI funds certain positions, but there's more to that than meets the eye. To begin with certain places like OCDA give money to UCI to pay fellows until they get hired permanently. Additionally, most PI places do not hire students right out of graduation. So UCI provides a fellowship that helps the student prove themselves to the organization they're trying to get a job with.
Lots of law schools are "collegial." But it's a meaningless term in the context of this decision. Whatever culture Irvine has, it certainly isn't a culture where a third of the class willingly opts out of bl/fc to pursue PI, unless their culture has undergone a radical transformation from literally two years ago when their PI rate was only 14.3% (and it was 8.9% the year before). This has nothing to do with culture, and everything to do with the fact that Irvine grads aren't getting jobs, and the school is trying to keep the boat afloat by funding positions (the recent increase in the number of these positions, you'll note, correlates perfectly to the recent increase in PI placement).

And of course it's true that many PI orgs don't hire students straight out of law school. But don't you find it a little telling that schools with bona fide strong PI placement don't have to make this excuse? (e.g., Boalt has a 19% PI score and a 5% school-funded score; NYU has a 19% PI score and a 7% school-funded score)

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Npret » Sun Apr 23, 2017 11:30 pm

Quick question about UCI - how big is the class? How many students are in PI funded by school now as opposed to before? Is the difference two or three people or twenty people?

I'm not a fan of the ego driven creation of a new law school like UCI and I have no clue how successful it is. I know he first class paid no tuition or something and got hand picked jobs. After that, no clue.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by ernie » Sun Apr 23, 2017 11:44 pm

Npret wrote:Quick question about UCI - how big is the class? How many students are in PI funded by school now as opposed to before? Is the difference two or three people or twenty people?

I'm not a fan of the ego driven creation of a new law school like UCI and I have no clue how successful it is. I know he first class paid no tuition or something and got hand picked jobs. After that, no clue.
2015: 37/94 PI (39.4%), 20 school-funded positions
2014: 21/80 PI (26.3%), 13 school-funded positions
2013: 12/62 PI (14.3%), 0 school-funded positions
2012: 5/51 PI (8.9%), 0 school-funded positions

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Npret » Mon Apr 24, 2017 3:14 am

ernie wrote:
Npret wrote:Quick question about UCI - how big is the class? How many students are in PI funded by school now as opposed to before? Is the difference two or three people or twenty people?

I'm not a fan of the ego driven creation of a new law school like UCI and I have no clue how successful it is. I know he first class paid no tuition or something and got hand picked jobs. After that, no clue.
2015: 37/94 PI (39.4%), 20 school-funded positions
2014: 21/80 PI (26.3%), 13 school-funded positions
2013: 12/62 PI (14.3%), 0 school-funded positions
2012: 5/51 PI (8.9%), 0 school-funded positions
Thanks!

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by zot1 » Mon Apr 24, 2017 8:39 am

ernie wrote:
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:
Deserving Porcupine wrote:
screwtapeletters wrote:Also, I think "collegial environment" is a misnomer. Generally speaking, the higher the employment rate, the more collegial schools will be, 'cause u wont have to be in the top 1/3 to get a job.
This may certainly be the case, for UCI I'd imagine it is a lot of people self-selecting into PI jobs which may make competition for Biglaw and firm jobs a bit more lax.
Irvine's 33.6% PI score is in large part attributable to the school's shockingly high 18.2% school-funded rate. Irvine having a high PI rate is a recent phenomenon, and correlates with a recent increase in school-funded positions.

Irvine's 15.5% biglaw placement is pretty grim. It has a respectable 12.7% clerkship rate, but that's in large part due to Chemerinsky making calls, and the word is out that he's looking to make a move.

Maybe you'll get biglaw, maybe not. You have the IP and PhD thing going for you. But attending either school is still a roll of the dice.
Sigh... here we go again.

UCI is collegial. That's the environment that has been fostered and the kind of students UCI attracts.

Yes, many students are gunning for PI and government over biglaw.

Yes, UCI funds certain positions, but there's more to that than meets the eye. To begin with certain places like OCDA give money to UCI to pay fellows until they get hired permanently. Additionally, most PI places do not hire students right out of graduation. So UCI provides a fellowship that helps the student prove themselves to the organization they're trying to get a job with.
Lots of law schools are "collegial." But it's a meaningless term in the context of this decision. Whatever culture Irvine has, it certainly isn't a culture where a third of the class willingly opts out of bl/fc to pursue PI, unless their culture has undergone a radical transformation from literally two years ago when their PI rate was only 14.3% (and it was 8.9% the year before). This has nothing to do with culture, and everything to do with the fact that Irvine grads aren't getting jobs, and the school is trying to keep the boat afloat by funding positions (the recent increase in the number of these positions, you'll note, correlates perfectly to the recent increase in PI placement).

And of course it's true that many PI orgs don't hire students straight out of law school. But don't you find it a little telling that schools with bona fide strong PI placement don't have to make this excuse? (e.g., Boalt has a 19% PI score and a 5% school-funded score; NYU has a 19% PI score and a 7% school-funded score)
Yes, UCI has people self selecting into those jobs. People who don't want to do PI and miss other boats end up in small/mid firms. They don't suddenly want to do PI because there is nothing else out there. PI orgs DO NOT hire people (even those funded with fellowships from the school) who do not demonstrate a commitment to PI or their cause.

And the community does foster a collegial environment. The stories are endless on this, you just don't know about them.

Berkeley and NYU have less students going to PI because they have more students gunning for Biglaw. But I'll admit I don't know everything there is to know about those schools because I didn't go there.

You may sit from the outside and make conclusions on numbers and that's fine. I speak from actual stuff that I know. I personally asked around about the school-funded positions and was convinced it made sense to have them. If I had been in PI, having the safety net of the school if I couldn't get Skadden or another fancy fellowship would have been nice. For example, we had three fellows to the Gideon's promise program where the law school paid for a one year felllowship and all three have now been hired full time as a result of the fellowship (http://www.gideonspromise.org/programs/lspp).

Anyway, keep speculating, I'm not really here to stop you.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by ernie » Mon Apr 24, 2017 10:42 am

zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:
Deserving Porcupine wrote:
screwtapeletters wrote:Also, I think "collegial environment" is a misnomer. Generally speaking, the higher the employment rate, the more collegial schools will be, 'cause u wont have to be in the top 1/3 to get a job.
This may certainly be the case, for UCI I'd imagine it is a lot of people self-selecting into PI jobs which may make competition for Biglaw and firm jobs a bit more lax.
Irvine's 33.6% PI score is in large part attributable to the school's shockingly high 18.2% school-funded rate. Irvine having a high PI rate is a recent phenomenon, and correlates with a recent increase in school-funded positions.

Irvine's 15.5% biglaw placement is pretty grim. It has a respectable 12.7% clerkship rate, but that's in large part due to Chemerinsky making calls, and the word is out that he's looking to make a move.

Maybe you'll get biglaw, maybe not. You have the IP and PhD thing going for you. But attending either school is still a roll of the dice.
Sigh... here we go again.

UCI is collegial. That's the environment that has been fostered and the kind of students UCI attracts.

Yes, many students are gunning for PI and government over biglaw.

Yes, UCI funds certain positions, but there's more to that than meets the eye. To begin with certain places like OCDA give money to UCI to pay fellows until they get hired permanently. Additionally, most PI places do not hire students right out of graduation. So UCI provides a fellowship that helps the student prove themselves to the organization they're trying to get a job with.
Lots of law schools are "collegial." But it's a meaningless term in the context of this decision. Whatever culture Irvine has, it certainly isn't a culture where a third of the class willingly opts out of bl/fc to pursue PI, unless their culture has undergone a radical transformation from literally two years ago when their PI rate was only 14.3% (and it was 8.9% the year before). This has nothing to do with culture, and everything to do with the fact that Irvine grads aren't getting jobs, and the school is trying to keep the boat afloat by funding positions (the recent increase in the number of these positions, you'll note, correlates perfectly to the recent increase in PI placement).

And of course it's true that many PI orgs don't hire students straight out of law school. But don't you find it a little telling that schools with bona fide strong PI placement don't have to make this excuse? (e.g., Boalt has a 19% PI score and a 5% school-funded score; NYU has a 19% PI score and a 7% school-funded score)
Yes, UCI has people self selecting into those jobs. People who don't want to do PI and miss other boats end up in small/mid firms. They don't suddenly want to do PI because there is nothing else out there. PI orgs DO NOT hire people (even those funded with fellowships from the school) who do not demonstrate a commitment to PI or their cause.

And the community does foster a collegial environment. The stories are endless on this, you just don't know about them.

Berkeley and NYU have less students going to PI because they have more students gunning for Biglaw. But I'll admit I don't know everything there is to know about those schools because I didn't go there.

You may sit from the outside and make conclusions on numbers and that's fine. I speak from actual stuff that I know. I personally asked around about the school-funded positions and was convinced it made sense to have them. If I had been in PI, having the safety net of the school if I couldn't get Skadden or another fancy fellowship would have been nice. For example, we had three fellows to the Gideon's promise program where the law school paid for a one year felllowship and all three have now been hired full time as a result of the fellowship (http://www.gideonspromise.org/programs/lspp).

Anyway, keep speculating, I'm not really here to stop you.
Sorry, your anecdotes and feelings don't trump actual facts and data. I'm glad that you were "convinced" that your alma mater isn't a rapidly declining trap school, that the "stories are endless" about the school's "collegial environment" which is important to you for some reason, and that three whole Irvine students got the Gideon's Promise fellowship. But all that combined doesn't amount to much. Here is the actual data.

(1) Irvine students are finding it increasingly difficult to obtain jobs, as evidenced by a massive shift in outcomes over the past two years. Irvine now has a 33.6% PI score, whereas that number has been as low as 8.9% in recent years. The reason for this increase is the explosion in school-funded positions—whereas the school initially did not fund positions, the school-funded position rate is a shocking 18.2%. When added to the horrifying 14.5% unemployment rate, one thing is indisputable: each successive Irvine class is having a progressively harder time getting jobs, and the administration hasn't done enough to stem the bleeding.

(2) The school's clerkship rate is in large part due to one person (Chemerinsky) making calls. Chemerinsky is, as has been reported widely, looking to leave Irvine. I will not speculate as to whether he is looking to leave Irvine because of the school's recent decline.

(3) Collegiality is a joke. It means absolutely nothing in the job market. Irvine's culture is not one in which a third of the class willingly opts out of bl/fc to pursue PI, unless their culture has undergone a radical transformation from three years ago when the PI rate was 8.9%. Something has changed, and Irvine grads aren't getting jobs. I will not speculate about why the decline is occurring and will stick to the facts: Irvine job outcomes get worse each year, and the actual data (as opposed to your pollyanna ancedotes) are not subject to reasonable dispute.

(4) In addition, you avoided my point about Boalt and NYU. My point is this: Of course it's true that many PI orgs don't hire students straight out of law school. But don't you find it a little telling that schools with bona fide strong PI placement don't have to make this excuse? (e.g., Boalt has a 19% PI score and a 5% school-funded score; NYU has a 19% PI score and a 7% school-funded score)

(5) No one said that Irvine has zero people self-selecting into PI. But the notion that people missing biglaw don't end up in PI fellowships as evidenced by PI orgs not hiring people without a demonstrated commitment to PI is laughable. If you bring your own funding and aren't a complete fuck-up, it is not terribly difficult to get a school-funded PI position, even if you resume does not evidence a commitment to the organization's cause. A short-staffed municipal law department is not going to turn down a year of free labor for its tort division because you don't wax poetic about the Hand Formula. What scares me about your comment is that it suggests that Irvine students can't even give their labor away.

Conclusion: Irvine is a classic trap school. We can argue about things that are actually in dispute: why Irvine is a trap school, whether it is better or worse than other trap schools, etc. But there is no dispute that Irvine grads, attracted to the school by its once excellent biglaw placement and low unemployment rates, are now being slaughtered in the job market.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by ernie » Mon Apr 24, 2017 10:53 am

OP I change my advice to you.

Originally I said either school is a roll of the dice, which I still believe to be true—frankly, neither of these schools is a great option and the correct course would be to retake.

But it's silly to pretend that these schools are the same; BU clearly has better job outcomes and is far more established: https://www.lstreports.com/compare/bu/irvine/

I wouldn't choose either of these schools personally, but if you had a gun to my head, it'd be BU, and it wouldn't be close.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by zot1 » Mon Apr 24, 2017 11:07 am

Ernie, they are not my feelings. Rather additional information about the school that you do not have.

Your hatred towards Irvine is hilarious, to be honest. The school will be fine no matter how much you say otherwise to strangers on an online forum.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Deserving Porcupine » Mon Apr 24, 2017 11:11 am

So, just to respond to a few of the comments here. I do appreciate everyone's feedback, and this dose of nihilism is more or less what I expected when I posted here.

UVA2B, your suggestion is an excellent one, and one I seriously considered about seven or eight months ago when I first started down this path. For a number or reasons, I decided to prepare for the LSAT and apply this cycle rather than staying for the patent bar and trying to get my foot in the door as a scientific adviser. I also considered the possibility of working as an investment analyst, but I digress. I would be happy to go over my thinking with you privately, but it includes personal details id rather not post publicly.

Which brings me to my next point. As Npret points out, there are some facts missing. My personal situation is very complicated, for reasons I won't go into on a public forum. I am not, however, "lost", even if I am for the time being fairly untethered geographically. I actually have a fairly robust network of immediate family who are pretty well qualified to opine on my plans, including siblings in Biglaw (junior and senior associates and former federal clerks), and family friends that include a former T14 Dean and a managing partner at a midlaw firm. I am not, therefore, approaching this decision from a position of ignorance. None of my network of family and friends have been nearly so pessimistic as the TLS community, but then again that was why I posted - for push back, not validation. Anyone selling the latter on TLS is likely to be sorely disappointed.

On another note, I've seen the school funded jobs data before, but am not sure that this is at all relevant to my decision because I am aiming to do IP, not PI.

Ernie, I assume in calculating those PI statistics you are lumping together PI and government jobs? Just curious. I've never really paid much attention to PI job statistics (cuz I don't care), but I assume they are normally lumped together like BL+FC?

That said, the BL+FC numbers from UCI are about 7% lower than BUs numbers, this may be self-selection, though it is hard to know for sure.



In any case, I really appreciate all the input and advice. I especially appreciate people stepping in to clarify aspects of PAYE and IBR when less-than-accurate information was presented. There are, after all, enough sources of misinformation out there. While I personally come here for opinions and not facts that can be easily verified with primary sources, it is safe to assume that many people don't think this way.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Deserving Porcupine » Mon Apr 24, 2017 11:12 am

I may be showing my ignorance here, but can someone give me the definition of a "trap school"?

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by zot1 » Mon Apr 24, 2017 11:15 am

ernie wrote:[

(1) Irvine students are finding it increasingly difficult to obtain jobs, as evidenced by a massive shift in outcomes over the past two years. Irvine now has a 33.6% PI score, whereas that number has been as low as 8.9% in recent years. The reason for this increase is the explosion in school-funded positions—whereas the school initially did not fund positions, the school-funded position rate is a shocking 18.2%. When added to the horrifying 14.5% unemployment rate, one thing is indisputable: each successive Irvine class is having a progressively harder time getting jobs, and the administration hasn't done enough to stem the bleeding.

(2) The school's clerkship rate is in large part due to one person (Chemerinsky) making calls. Chemerinsky is, as has been reported widely, looking to leave Irvine. I will not speculate as to whether he is looking to leave Irvine because of the school's recent decline.

(3) Collegiality is a joke. It means absolutely nothing in the job market. Irvine's culture is not one in which a third of the class willingly opts out of bl/fc to pursue PI, unless their culture has undergone a radical transformation from three years ago when the PI rate was 8.9%. Something has changed, and Irvine grads aren't getting jobs. I will not speculate about why the decline is occurring and will stick to the facts: Irvine job outcomes get worse each year, and the actual data (as opposed to your pollyanna ancedotes) are not subject to reasonable dispute.

(4) In addition, you avoided my point about Boalt and NYU. My point is this: Of course it's true that many PI orgs don't hire students straight out of law school. But don't you find it a little telling that schools with bona fide strong PI placement don't have to make this excuse? (e.g., Boalt has a 19% PI score and a 5% school-funded score; NYU has a 19% PI score and a 7% school-funded score)

(5) No one said that Irvine has zero people self-selecting into PI. But the notion that people missing biglaw don't end up in PI fellowships as evidenced by PI orgs not hiring people without a demonstrated commitment to PI is laughable. If you bring your own funding and aren't a complete fuck-up, it is not terribly difficult to get a school-funded PI position, even if you resume does not evidence a commitment to the organization's cause. A short-staffed municipal law department is not going to turn down a year of free labor for its tort division because you don't wax poetic about the Hand Formula. What scares me about your comment is that it suggests that Irvine students can't even give their labor away.

Conclusion: Irvine is a classic trap school. We can argue about things that are actually in dispute: why Irvine is a trap school, whether it is better or worse than other trap schools, etc. But there is no dispute that Irvine grads, attracted to the school by its once excellent biglaw placement and low unemployment rates, are now being slaughtered in the job market.
1. That's one way to look at it. But what's actually happening is students being able to do what they wanted to do, which is PI work. I showed you one example, Gideon's. That's just 3 out of the 20 school-funded positions. I know it seems impossible to you that not everyone wants biglaw, but hey, it happens.

2. Not everyone gets a clerkship because of Dean C. But go on, people keep making these claims without facts to support them.

3. Collegiality matters. It makes your time in school more bearable. It makes the student/alumni network stronger.

4. I didn't ignore it. You're ignoring what I did say about it.

5. When we are talking about pure public interest work (not government work, that is accounted for in a different category labeled "government."), organizations will NOT choose you over someone with demonstrated commitment.

Any way, five years ago I was told in TLS that UCI was about to crumble into pieces and go away. You're not the first to say this and won't be the last.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Rigo » Mon Apr 24, 2017 11:23 am

Deserving Porcupine wrote:
screwtapeletters wrote:Also, I think "collegial environment" is a misnomer. Generally speaking, the higher the employment rate, the more collegial schools will be, 'cause u wont have to be in the top 1/3 to get a job.
This may certainly be the case, for UCI I'd imagine it is a lot of people self-selecting into PI jobs which may make competition for Biglaw and firm jobs a bit more lax.
Eh I've schools in the T15-30 range are the most competitive, so I wouldn't count too hard on this.

If you're going to insist on going to law school, I say UCI over BU but I don't think you should go this fall.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Npret » Mon Apr 24, 2017 1:28 pm

Deserving Porcupine wrote:I may be showing my ignorance here, but can someone give me the definition of a "trap school"?
A school that superficially looks good due to location, etc.. Prof Campos came up with the term I think.
http://insidethelawschoolscam.blogspot. ... s.html?m=1

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by AT9 » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:44 pm

Have you applied to any other T50 or so schools? If you can't retake, your spouse can't work, and you're set on law school, I'd shoot for any respectable school in a relatively cheap COL that throws a lot of money at you. I'd rather go to someplace like Kentucky or UNLV for manageable debt over a "T30" or whatever for the price of a decent house.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by trebekismyhero » Mon Apr 24, 2017 3:05 pm

AT9 wrote:Have you applied to any other T50 or so schools? If you can't retake, your spouse can't work, and you're set on law school, I'd shoot for any respectable school in a relatively cheap COL that throws a lot of money at you. I'd rather go to someplace like Kentucky or UNLV for manageable debt over a "T30" or whatever for the price of a decent house.
Yes, OP your numbers would probably get a full ride from UIUC and close to it from other schools with just as good if not better job numbers than BU and UCI.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Deserving Porcupine » Mon Apr 24, 2017 4:11 pm

I pretty much blanketed the T30, since I had an LSAC fee waiver. WL at Emory, ND, BC, and Columbia (fat chance). Yet to hear from USC or UCLA, but if I get in I doubt I'd get much in the way of scholarships...

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Npret » Mon Apr 24, 2017 4:36 pm

Deserving Porcupine wrote:I pretty much blanketed the T30, since I had an LSAC fee waiver. WL at Emory, ND, BC, and Columbia (fat chance). Yet to hear from USC or UCLA, but if I get in I doubt I'd get much in the way of scholarships...
Did you ask for advice? How did you chose those schools? Not criticism I want to see your thought process. Lots of people apply the same way but it can appear random to an outsider.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by Deserving Porcupine » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:00 pm

I was gunning for a T13, of course, but realistically my LSAT is about 3 points short given my GPA. The earliest I could take the test this year was December, so I initially applied to the T20 and when my test came back a disappointing 166, I started applying to schools 21-30. I did focus on certain markets that are IP-heavy, like Boston, but ultimately the hope was to go somewhere that will prioritize Biglaw chances, and secondarily portability (though I am aware that outside the T13 all schools are pretty regional)

I also took the February test, but wasn't able to study very much and so didn't get a higher score, unfortunately.

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by AT9 » Mon Apr 24, 2017 6:06 pm

Deserving Porcupine wrote:I was gunning for a T13, of course, but realistically my LSAT is about 3 points short given my GPA. The earliest I could take the test this year was December, so I initially applied to the T20 and when my test came back a disappointing 166, I started applying to schools 21-30. I did focus on certain markets that are IP-heavy, like Boston, but ultimately the hope was to go somewhere that will prioritize Biglaw chances, and secondarily portability (though I am aware that outside the T13 all schools are pretty regional)

I also took the February test, but wasn't able to study very much and so didn't get a higher score, unfortunately.
Why not reapply to some other schools? The T20, T30, etc. are fairly meaningless designations. Most schools from 20ish-60ish have similar placement rates and "prestige." They tend to offer little portability, a real but small shot at biglaw (~10-30%), and relatively decent overall employment numbers. There are a few exceptions, but they're almost certainly not worth a crushing amount of debt. Especially with a spouse and kids to support. IMO, you have a few options:

1. Don't go to law school and search for a more desirable job (or some other graduate education).

2. Retake until you can get into a ~T13 with $$$ (this is probably your best option since you seem to want biglaw/big city).

3. Go to a decent school (i.e., likely one ranked in the 30s - 50s or so) in a location you could live with that will give you a full scholarship. For that matter, there may be a couple of part time programs in this range that could give you $$$ and the ability to work part time, though I'm not as familiar with PT programs.

Many of your target T20/30, ironically, are maybe the worst options for you because they cost as much as a T13 while providing outcomes more similar to schools you could go to without paying tuition (the definition of a "trap school," at least as applied to your situation).

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ernie

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by ernie » Mon Apr 24, 2017 6:54 pm

zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:(1) Irvine students are finding it increasingly difficult to obtain jobs, as evidenced by a massive shift in outcomes over the past two years. Irvine now has a 33.6% PI score, whereas that number has been as low as 8.9% in recent years. The reason for this increase is the explosion in school-funded positions—whereas the school initially did not fund positions, the school-funded position rate is a shocking 18.2%. When added to the horrifying 14.5% unemployment rate, one thing is indisputable: each successive Irvine class is having a progressively harder time getting jobs, and the administration hasn't done enough to stem the bleeding.
1. That's one way to look at it. But what's actually happening is students being able to do what they wanted to do, which is PI work. I showed you one example, Gideon's. That's just 3 out of the 20 school-funded positions. I know it seems impossible to you that not everyone wants biglaw, but hey, it happens.
No, it doesn't seem impossible to me that not everyone wants biglaw—I'm a public interest person myself. What I am pointing out, and what you refuse to acknowledge, is that Irvine's biglaw numbers have plummeted over the past few years. You can chalk that up to sudden opt-out en masse if you want, but the simplest answer is usually the correct one: Irvine does not have strong biglaw placement because there are plenty of other, much better and more established schools in CA for large firms to recruit from. At first Irvine did better with biglaw placement because of its tiny class sizes. As the class sizes have increased, the number of students getting biglaw has not increased along with it, meaning a higher percentage of strike outs.
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote: (2) The school's clerkship rate is in large part due to one person (Chemerinsky) making calls. Chemerinsky is, as has been reported widely, looking to leave Irvine. I will not speculate as to whether he is looking to leave Irvine because of the school's recent decline.
2. Not everyone gets a clerkship because of Dean C. But go on, people keep making these claims without facts to support them.
Yes, I definitely said that everyone gets a clerkship because of Chemerinsky. Keep attacking that straw man.
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote: (3) Collegiality is a joke. It means absolutely nothing in the job market. Irvine's culture is not one in which a third of the class willingly opts out of bl/fc to pursue PI, unless their culture has undergone a radical transformation from three years ago when the PI rate was 8.9%. Something has changed, and Irvine grads aren't getting jobs. I will not speculate about why the decline is occurring and will stick to the facts: Irvine job outcomes get worse each year, and the actual data (as opposed to your pollyanna ancedotes) are not subject to reasonable dispute.
3. Collegiality matters. It makes your time in school more bearable. It makes the student/alumni network stronger.
This is a joke. Every trap school attendee on these fora opines that their school is the pinnacle of collegiality. Everyone shares their outlines! Our alumni network is so strong!

First, UC Irvine has had a grand total of five graduating classes. So don't even try to suggest that Irvine has a strong alumni network. Second, collegiality doesn't track with opt out (which is the clear impression you were trying to give when you responded to my initial post about high PI/school-funded by referring to collegiality).
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:(4) In addition, you avoided my point about Boalt and NYU. My point is this: Of course it's true that many PI orgs don't hire students straight out of law school. But don't you find it a little telling that schools with bona fide strong PI placement don't have to make this excuse? (e.g., Boalt has a 19% PI score and a 5% school-funded score; NYU has a 19% PI score and a 7% school-funded score)
4. I didn't ignore it. You're ignoring what I did say about it.
No, you ignored it. You're not able to rebut my facts and figures, and so you're trying to divert the argument.
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote: (5) No one said that Irvine has zero people self-selecting into PI. But the notion that people missing biglaw don't end up in PI fellowships as evidenced by PI orgs not hiring people without a demonstrated commitment to PI is laughable. If you bring your own funding and aren't a complete fuck-up, it is not terribly difficult to get a school-funded PI position, even if you resume does not evidence a commitment to the organization's cause. A short-staffed municipal law department is not going to turn down a year of free labor for its tort division because you don't wax poetic about the Hand Formula. What scares me about your comment is that it suggests that Irvine students can't even give their labor away.
5. When we are talking about pure public interest work (not government work, that is accounted for in a different category labeled "government."), organizations will NOT choose you over someone with demonstrated commitment.
This entire time, I have quite obviously been referring to LST's public service score, which combines public interest orgs and government. The fact that I repeatedly referred to a score of 33.6% makes this abundantly clear. Moreover, you clearly have no idea of what you're talking about. Some public interest orgs are quite selective, but many would have no problem accepting a year of completely free labor from someone with no background or demonstrated commitment in the practice area. If you think it's that hard for a person who is 100% funded for a full year to find a position working on, say, housing for some flyover country Legal Services org, you obviously know nothing about the legal market.
zot1 wrote:
ernie wrote:Conclusion: Irvine is a classic trap school. We can argue about things that are actually in dispute: why Irvine is a trap school, whether it is better or worse than other trap schools, etc. But there is no dispute that Irvine grads, attracted to the school by its once excellent biglaw placement and low unemployment rates, are now being slaughtered in the job market.
Any way, five years ago I was told in TLS that UCI was about to crumble into pieces and go away. You're not the first to say this and won't be the last.
Irvine is not imminently going to crumble into pieces and go away. I never said that. I was going to write a post just dismissing you as a loon, but then I started thinking about how many people might read your post and be convinced to attend what is, by all accounts, a rapidly declining trap school. I understand being a homer for your school, but your post is actively deceptive. Real people are making real decisions about their lives here, and we owe people who ask for advice our full candor.

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trebekismyhero

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by trebekismyhero » Mon Apr 24, 2017 7:05 pm

AT9 wrote:
Deserving Porcupine wrote:I was gunning for a T13, of course, but realistically my LSAT is about 3 points short given my GPA. The earliest I could take the test this year was December, so I initially applied to the T20 and when my test came back a disappointing 166, I started applying to schools 21-30. I did focus on certain markets that are IP-heavy, like Boston, but ultimately the hope was to go somewhere that will prioritize Biglaw chances, and secondarily portability (though I am aware that outside the T13 all schools are pretty regional)

I also took the February test, but wasn't able to study very much and so didn't get a higher score, unfortunately.
Why not reapply to some other schools? The T20, T30, etc. are fairly meaningless designations. Most schools from 20ish-60ish have similar placement rates and "prestige." They tend to offer little portability, a real but small shot at biglaw (~10-30%), and relatively decent overall employment numbers. There are a few exceptions, but they're almost certainly not worth a crushing amount of debt. Especially with a spouse and kids to support. IMO, you have a few options:

1. Don't go to law school and search for a more desirable job (or some other graduate education).

2. Retake until you can get into a ~T13 with $$$ (this is probably your best option since you seem to want biglaw/big city).

3. Go to a decent school (i.e., likely one ranked in the 30s - 50s or so) in a location you could live with that will give you a full scholarship. For that matter, there may be a couple of part time programs in this range that could give you $$$ and the ability to work part time, though I'm not as familiar with PT programs.

Many of your target T20/30, ironically, are maybe the worst options for you because they cost as much as a T13 while providing outcomes more similar to schools you could go to without paying tuition (the definition of a "trap school," at least as applied to your situation).
OP, listen to this. This is 100% correct

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zot1

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by zot1 » Mon Apr 24, 2017 7:41 pm

You're right, Ernie. I'm just here trying to trap people. You got me!

ernie

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Re: BU vs UCI

Post by ernie » Tue Apr 25, 2017 12:27 am

zot1 wrote:You're right, Ernie. I'm just here trying to trap people. You got me!
I know.

Seriously? What are you waiting for?

Now there's a charge.
Just kidding ... it's still FREE!


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